Director in Focus – David Lynch

Here at Umbrella we really do love a good cult film! You know the kind, a film you can stay up late and watch while baking brownies and eating half the mixture before it makes it in to the oven? What? You don’t do that? It’s just me?!

Late night eating aside, fancy some delicious cult treats? Well, let me introduce you to the master of cult, the king of intrigue, the sultan of the surreal, David Lynch. The film repertoire of David Lynch is responsible for some of the most surreal, suspenseful and bizarre moments in film history. It’s wonderful, strange and beautifully crazy stuff!

From the birth of the mutant baby in Eraserhead on DVD and Blu ray, through to the grotesque misery of The Elephant Man and the oxygen-mask sucking psycho in Blue Velvet, to the twisted noir of Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive, Lynch’s films explore a surface world of sunshine which harbours a nefarious underbelly.

ERASERHEAD (1977) – This surreal classic is David Lynch‘s first feature film and sets the tone for his ground breaking career. Have a look at the trailer:

THE DAVID LYNCH SHORT FILM COLLECTION – Six short films from the master of the macabre, spanning Lynch’s student experiments in the 60s, to the fully realised visions of the 80s. Includes Six Men Getting Sick, The Alphabet, The Grandmother, The Amputee, The Cowboy and the Frenchman, and Lumiere.

LYNCH 01 – Compiled from 2 years of footage, this feature-length documentary is a fascinating and intimate portrait of Lynch’s creative process as he completes his latest film, Inland Empire.

DYNAMIC 01 – A recent series of shorts written, directed, edited and scored by Lynch available exclusively on davidlynch.com.

DUMBLAND – The macabre animation series described by Lynch as “crude, stupid, violent, absurd.”

If that wasn’t enough to whet your appetite, check out this hauntingly surreal psychological thrillerMy Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done. My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Doneis an amazing DVD film collaboration between David Lynch and Werner Herzog. Directed by Werner Herzog and produced by David Lynch, this film is an intense observation of the mind and madness behind a brutal crime. It tells the story of Brad McCullum (Oscar® nominee Michael Shannon, Revolutionary Road), an engaging and committed stage actor who becomes obsessed with the Greek tragedy he is rehearsing. With a promising career ahead of him and engaged to bright young Ingrid (Oscar® nominee Chloë Sevigny, Boys Don’t Cry), Brad slips into a spiral of mystifying intrigue that will ultimately become his undoing.

A psychological thriller of the deepest and darkest kind, My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done also features Oscar® nominee Willem Dafoe (Shadow of the Vampire) with Brad Dourif (Deadwood), Grace Zabriskie (Big Love) and Udo Kier (Halloween).